


My Stars Shine Darkly

by girlbookwrm



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Backstory, Gen, How They Met, Origin Story, POV Jim Moriarty, You Have Been Warned, it's basically a collection of my personal headcanons about moran and moriarty, kind of, like a meetcute but with more murder and stalking, pretentious title is pretentious, so much backstory you guys wow, though tbh it's p tame for MorMor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-17
Updated: 2017-07-05
Packaged: 2018-11-15 06:22:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11225145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girlbookwrm/pseuds/girlbookwrm
Summary: By your patience, no. My stars shine darkly overme...- Sebastian, Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene 1An Introduction in Three Acts, aka How Moriarty met Moran, how Moran became Moran, and how Moran became Moriarty's.





	1. Act One: Malignancy of Fate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LadyLieDie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyLieDie/gifts).



> This story is basically my attempt to solidify my personal headcanons about Sebastian Moran. What his childhood was like, how he became a colonel, how he met Moriarty, how they ended up working together. I comply to the canon only when it suits me. I blame LadyLieDie for all of this.

# Act I 

>      … the **malignancy of my fate** might perhaps
> 
> distemper yours…
> 
> \- Sebastian, Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene 1

  

## Scene 1:

###  _London, Conduit Street: Christmas 2009_

 

I've been in London nine years, and there's been a price on my head for ten, but no one has ever, ever taken Byrne up on the offer. (Silly man, what was he thinking? Did he really imagine that if he put a price on my head -- _mine_ \-- that I'd leave him alone at last? That I'd stop manipulating his business to my purposes? That I'd ever, ever, ever _stop_?) Even when it crept out of six figure and into seven figure territory, no one dared to suggest that they'd be interested in trying to kill James Moriarty.

 

* * *

 

 

The note slides in with the post and drops with a whisper onto the Victorian tiles of the entryway. I pad downstairs, coffee in hand, head chattering with the plans that kept me up all night and--

A stained and folded scrap of notepaper. The Virgin doesn't own every vagrant in the city (my city) after all. I pay better, and I'm perfectly happy to pay with cocaine, and heroin, and whatever else they want. There's a December chill rolling in under the door and tasteful Christmas cheer audible through the walls. (The Carol of the Bells. The ladies who operate the shop under #42 -- peddling perfume and guns with equal amounts of ruthless efficiency -- they know not to play anything other than what I tell them to.)

I unfold the paper and read:

COL. S. MORAN HAS TAKEN BYRNE’S OFFER

For a full two seconds, there is blissful silence in my head, all the chatter gone, smooth as an arm sweeping across a cluttered desk. And then the single thought:

_Don't be boring.  Please don't be boring._

 

* * *

 

I find him before he can find me. I should just have him shot, probably. He's probably just some stupid, desperate little two-bit criminal who doesn't know not to cross me.

He'll learn better, but too late, too late.

Still though. There's something, something, _something_ about him. _Colonel_ , his records say, but that can't be right. _Conspicuous Gallantry Cross_ , it says, but that can’t be right either…

His records are clearly tampered with, which is interesting, but not immediately helpful, so I set them aside. I’ll get a real look at him, _see_ what I’m dealing with.

Getting his address is child's play. The colonel seems to have fallen on hard times: it's a dismal little bedsit in a dreadful corner of the city. Tottenham is going to burst into flames some day soon, I know it.   

London's cameras yield up their secrets like the pretty little whores they are. The grainy CCTV footage doesn't show enough -- just a vague, slender shape leaning on a railing, having a smoke, but I can't see his face, can't see the details (and details are everything.)

I could go have a peep myself, but I do so hate getting my hands dirty, and it is so very hard to get the smell of council estate out of Italian leather shoes. I send someone to bug his flat and set up cameras of my own.

 

* * *

 

He finds the bugs.

_Rude._

 

* * *

 

 

## Scene 2:  

###  _London, Tottenham: New Year's 2010_

 

I end up wandering through Tottenham on New Year's Eve with my hands tucked into my (filthy, common) hoodie pockets and my shoes (hideous, tacky, perfect for the character) squeaking on the cracked and dirty concrete. I take a seat on a broken park bench, roll myself a cigarette with the most horrifically disgusting tobacco available (the cheapest way to kill yourself slowly), and wait.

He's at The Tankerville, I know. Playing cards, if my sources don't lie (they don't, they know better).  He'll come home soon enough.

I'm annoyed. Annoyed that I felt compelled to do anything, much less put on a disgusting persona to follow a disappointing man back to his dismal flat. Still. Best to be thorough.

Around one in the morning, he comes striding by -- _prowling_ by -- battered leather jacket and old combat boots and badly fitted jeans and a cigarette like mine. The reek of cheap tobacco blooms in drab brown and toxic green in my brain. He stomps it out on the pavement and swears, then jogs up the stairs to his flat. He scans around him, notices me. His eyes narrow. I keep staring blankly ahead with my hood pulled up, pretending not to see him.  He lets himself into his flat.  

His bug free flat.

Annoying.

Boring.

Is he? Isn't he? He took the job. He found the bugs. Annoying as that is, he must be not totally useless. He is a colonel, but that doesn't mean anything. Not really, because he's too young, only 33, so he couldn't have _earned_ it, he was given it somehow. I drop my own cigarette and grimace at it before stamping it out with the toe of my trainers.  

On the way back to Conduit Street, I decide not to kill him.  Not yet anyway.

I want to see what he'll do.

 

 

* * *

 

## Scene 3:

###  _London, the Dorchester: January 2010_

 

The new year is only just beginning to tarnish, and someone is following me.  

Not _me_ me. But the man who’s portraying me in the play of life right now. (His name is Stapleton, and he’s a complete psychopath, so he’s a natural to play the part, but he needs monitoring. Where he goes, I go.)

Stapleton knows that _I'm_ following him, but he doesn’t notice the _other_ man following him.

I do.

He's following Moriarty (Stapleton's version of Moriarty) the way that only the best can. Which means that he knows where Moriarty be and he's sitting inconspicuously there when Moriarty arrives. I don’t always see him, but sometimes I catch a glimpse of blonde hair at a coffee shop or a whiff of cheap tobacco as I walk past an alley. Drab brown and toxic green.

How does he know where Moriarty will be? Someone on the inside. Someone is talking. Well. I know how to deal with that. But I’m… grudgingly impressed that he managed to find a chink in my armor.   _Mine_. 

And it’s not _too_ irritating. I know a quick fix to stop him following me. A man like _that_ has limits.  A man who wears old combat boots and smokes cheap tobacco and goes to shite clubs like The Tankerville -- there are places he cannot go. And if my contacts are somewhat alarmed that I've started favoring The Dorchester for meetings, well. They'll just have to deal with it, won't they?  And anyway, it's a fun, fun game, sitting in the Dorchester, which bleeds money from every gilded filigree and marble floor. It's _fun_ , to make East End gangsters rent a suit to come here.  They’re all _so funny_.

Stapleton plays the part admirably. He _looks_ the part; hunched shoulders, long thin neck and a shiny dome of a forehead made all the more prominent by thinning hair. He looks like some sinister professor, and he’s got cold, dead eyes. He sits at the table, reigning over mafiosos and mobsters and murderers, and he behaves himself because he knows I’m watching.

And where am I? I’m invisible. The piano player always is -- especially if he sticks to classical and keeps his head down. I know my Bach piano concertos, can play them without even having to think about it. Leaves me free to watch Stapleton pretending to be me.

Still. I can’t shake the feeling that there's something wrong, something I've missed, something, _something--_

There.

It's--

It can't be--

(Idiot, of course it can, anything can, I'm living proof of that.)

There's a man in the corner, drinking Glenfiddich (I can tell by the color, I can always, _always_ tell) and scrolling through something on his posh phone--

It's _him_.

Blonde hair slicked back, and those shoes are Gucci, I'd know them anywhere. But he wears the suit like he was born in it and he doesn't stink of bad tobacco, not tonight. He stinks of money. Old money. And power. How did I miss that?

But there's still a scar through his blonde brow and the tie is tugged just slightly to one side. His eyes are blue, blue like the empty desert sky. Blue like the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, bursting in my brain in shades of cerulean and cobalt.

And maybe?

Maybe he isn't boring.  

But I can’t be sure until I _know_ him, inside and out, backwards and forwards. And then I’ll kill him, of course. Because once I _know_ him, he'll be boring, and then I can kill him without a care in the world.

Dessert arrives for Stapleton -- he hasn’t noticed that he’s being watched (careless). The chocolate mousse here is almost as delicious as the man with the Glenfiddich in the corner, pretending to read his phone, but watching, watching, watching.


	2. Act II: Bear My Evils

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which there is Too Much Backstory.

# Act II

 

 

 

>   … therefore I shall crave of you your pardon
> 
> that I may **bear my evils** alone…
> 
> \- Sebastian, Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene 1

## Scene 1:

###  _London, Conduit Street: 2010 / India, New Delhi: 1975_

 

I will learn him, back to front and upside down. More than just a name and an address -- I want to know _everything_. And that will require a bit of digging. The records may be tampered with, but even lies can tell the truth.

I'm back at the flat, midnight fast approaching, still wearing my suit but with the tie loosened from a noose to a lazy, crooked collar. I crack my fingers, and set them to the keyboard. We're off to the races. Military records. MI-5 "security," ha.  I'm in the database, practically in their heads. Sebastian Moran. My dear so-called colonel, there's more here redacted than not. Me oh my, what _did_ you get up to?

But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Begin at the beginning. Medical records, medical records. Medical records rarely lie. Here they are. Birthdate.

November 3, 1975. How did it happen? How did you appear? As the crisp weather came in and children went from flat to flat, collecting pennies for their Guys, did Sebastian Moran come kicking and screaming into the world? My feverish mind fills in the gaps too quickly.

Medical records, birth certificate...

No, no, that picture is wrong. I read more, opening ten, twenty, a hundred tabs at once and hacking seven separate databases. I have to know. What is the right picture?

Not London. New Delhi, thanks to a father playing Ambassador (and a mother playing spy, but no one knew about that except good old Augustus, did they?)

November 3rd. Amavasya: the new moon, the third day of Diwali. Sacred to Lakshmi. While diya lights glittered in open doors and windows, bright rangoli were drawn in courtyards and living rooms, and fireworks chased away the evil spirits (like me, like me), Sebastian Moran fell quietly into the world, too soon, too small. Premature baby, not expected to live.  

But you were stubborn from day one. Mother and son were home by Christmas, it seems. Into the waiting arms of an aayah and under the watchful eyes of the two Augustuses -- senior and junior both following baby Sebastian with careful blue eyes.

He grew up in the dust and rain, the heat and the shadows, the grandeur and the squalor. India. I can almost taste it -- yellow curry and sweat. A British weed growing fast in the Indian soil.

 

* * *

 

## Scene 2:

###  _A family photo, Moran Manor: 1983_

 

Eight years later, Augustus the elder becomes head of the family upon the death of his older brother. They move into the Moran Estate in the Peak District in 1983. Must've been a shock to go from a warm and noisy townhouse in the heart of one of the most crowded cities in the world to this damp and drafty castellated manor house in the middle of bloody nowhere. They take a hideous family portrait standing in the gateway of one of the old towers.  

He's a mama's boy, really. I can tell by the way he curls his tiny hand around hers and _clings_. He's wearing a little suit too, how _precious_ , with his hair -- childishly white-blonde -- slicked back from his forehead in neat lines.  Squinting with those blue, blue eyes -- he's got extraordinary vision, the kind that pains you from being perhaps a little _too_ good. Looks about ready to squirm right out of the picture. The child psychologists say roughly the same thing from year to year: anxious, sensitive, nervous. That's going to blossom into rage in a few years, if it hasn't already. 

(When I was eight--when I was eight, well... Not a mama's boy, am I.)

Family isn't everything -- it's where everything _starts_ . More-ANNE, not MORE-an, but they're more Irish than they like to pretend. Three gold stars on a sable background. _Lucent in tenebris._ Townhouse in London, hunting lodge in Scotland, family hall in the Peaks, blah, blah, blah.  

The father, the father. He was once a rebellious younger son, but he fell into line after University. Went into politics, like he was always meant to. And when his older brother died (hunting accident, too young, too young, so tragic) he packed up his diplomatic career and headed home. It's 1983, and the beginning of the end for the idyllic childhood of Dear Sebastian.

There's the older brother -- much older, almost seven years senior -- but still Augustus Junior. And in the picture, fifteen years old and it already rankles, being _junior_. He's two years into Eton, home for the summer hols and he's already had his personality painted over by the nose-in-the-air, posh-but-I-don't-need-it, lazy arrogance that comes with being an Etonian.

Augustus, and Augustus. They stand there like sentinels, signs of what could have been, but wasn't. The men Sebastian _could_ have grown to be, but _didn't_.

The family picture: the four of them standing close, but not that close. I can see the shivering tectonic plates, the chasm opening between the two halves of the family.

On the one side are the Augustuses -- they really might be two of the same, they are such carbon copies -- but then again no. Younger son,  Rebellious streak. Sebastian is more Augustus than he likes to think.

And on the other side, mother and son. Viola and Sebastian -- was there an uncle?  Yes, yes there was. Viola’s brother -- another one who died young -- and then a son named in his memory. So Shakespearean. So English, for a fiery Scottish lass who made her way to London with a talent for languages, made herself very useful indeed during the Cold War, and then snagged herself a Lord.

Did Augustus really think that she would settle quietly into life as a country gentleman's wife? Did _she_?

 

* * *

 

## Scene 3:

###  _Eton: 1988-93_

 

Five unhappy years in England, and there's already talk of a divorce as Sebastian is shipped off to Eton in his turn. He still speaks Hindi when he's not thinking about it, and doesn't that go over well? Skinny little nobody with a weird accent and sharp eyes. Too much brain, too much mouth, not enough fear.

(I know a bit about that, don't I? He's been at Eton a year when there's a boy thrashing in the water and the smell of chlorine sickly yellow in my brain. Nothing to do with Moran, of course, but I can't help drawing parallels, have never been able to help it. I'm at a London pool, biting my tongue bloody because I can't laugh, no matter how funny it is.)

From a distance, it looks like Sebastian is adjusting, painting himself in Eton colors, but he isn't. When you look closely (and I always look closely) there's a sneer in his school photos, and he's bulking out under his rugby uniform. Not all those bruises come from the pitch, do they.

And well -- Viola cited domestic violence in her divorce. That might have been dramatics, but Augustus Sr was always one for power and control, wasn't he? Shouldn't have married a spy, then, should he. Sebastian never was the sort to take a punch without striking back, and neither is his mother. She takes half the family fortune with her when she goes and she goes...

Where?

The records go quiet, unwilling to sing for me.

She drops off the map more thoroughly than you would expect, but she's not exactly a civilian is she?

 

* * *

 

## Scene 4:

###  _Oxford, Sandhurst, Afghanistan, Iraq: 1993-2001_

 

Within a few years, neither is he. He goes to Oxford, gets a degree because he can and it's in English Literature because it's what he likes and then he enlists because why the fuck not? Blood and travel. There's a hunger there. I recognize the look.

So then it's Sandhurst and 2nd Lieutenant Moran becomes Lieutenant Moran quickly enough. Sniper training because he's a stellar shot -- those sharp eyes come in handy now. But he's a leader too. The higher ups didn't much like him -- he didn't _take_ orders well, but oh how he _gave_ them. He's a Machiavellian wet dream -- people always forget that Machiavelli said that it was better to be feared than loved, but **best** to be feared _and_ loved. 

 

>   _Captain Moran, he's a scary bastard, but I'd follow him to hell and back._
> 
> _The Captain? Moran's a hard-ass, I'd hate to be on his bad side, but he's got our backs._
> 
> _Trust him with my life, but I don't_ trust _him, if you know what I mean_.

 

Army buddies always talk in the end. Especially to a lady who knows what they like.  

 _Captain_ Moran, though. They don't talk about Colonel, but there it is in his records. And he couldn't have been more than a Major when his career came to an abrupt screeching halt.

So the question isn't about his rise, it's about his _fall_. How did he end up following me like this: a wolf without a pack, hunting for his own pleasure?

 

* * *

 

## Scene 5:

###  _Conduit Street: 2010_

 

I know enough now to be curious.  But even my curiosity is stymied and I hate that.  The redacted files are tight-lipped.  

Captain Moran was promoted to Major in 2006 after being mentioned in dispatches at Char Asiab, Afghanistan, fighting against a local warlord there, The Tiger.

That was four years ago.

And now he's living in a shite flat in Tottenham.  His file claims that he's a colonel, claims that he has a Conspicuous Gallantry Cross, but doesn't say what for, says he was granted an honorable discharge, but something about that doesn't seem right.  And when I get deep into the code, I find that the discharge was twelve months ago but the records were adjusted three months ago to say honorable, colonel, conspicuous gallantry.  It stinks of Augustus -- senior or junior, impossible to say -- protecting the family honor.

But what was he covering up?

Curiouser and curiouser, but the trail runs cold at last.  Not everything can be found in computer screens.

Oh well.  Time to go straight to the source.


	3. Act III: Bad Recpmpense

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which They Finally Meet

# Act III

  


 … it were a **bad**

**recompense** for your love, to lay any of them on you.

\- Sebastian, Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene 1

 

 

## Scene 1

###  _Char Asiab: January 2010_

Not Moran himself, of course, not yet. But I have people _everywhere_. Even in Afghanistan, if I fancy it.

They still talk about the warlord Moran took down.   _The Tiger of Char Asiab_ . Powerful men like that don’t go down easy -- they don’t go down without _consequences_.

I should know. I’m one of them.

It only takes two days to dig up the story. One of the warlords who filled the void left by the Tiger is still alive, and I can make him talk.

It’s midnight again -- in London, not Char Asiab.  A man’s face appears on my computer screen.  He has the lean, hungry, dead-eyed look I see so often in the faces of ruthless killers.

“Who are you?” he demands, in Pashto.  “Show your face.”

I tsk at the screen -- no camera on my end, of course.  I type back.

NO.

“What do you want?”

TELL ME ABOUT SEBASTIAN MORAN.

A sneer twists the face on the screen. He turns his head, spits on the ground, and says something very rude indeed.  

I WAS HOPING YOU’D GO DEEPER.

“Why should I tell you?”

BECAUSE I CAN PAY.

He looks grudgingly interested.

AND BECAUSE I’LL KILL YOU IF YOU DON’T.

His look hardens. “You’ll kill me anyway.”

MAYBE.

MAYBE NOT.

I’LL DEFINITELY KILL YOU IF YOU DON’T START TALKING THOUGH.

His lip twists.  But he also starts talking.  “I was the Tiger’s right hand man.  Moran gave me this…” he pulls down the collar of his shirt to show an ugly gash across his throat.  Could have killed him.  Probably almost did.  “The night he killed the Tiger.”

I tsk at the screen again, frustrated.

IF YOU’RE ONLY GOING TO TELL ME BORING THINGS, PERHAPS I’LL JUST KILL YOU NOW.

“That’s not the end of the story,” the man says quickly -- he’s wisely afraid for his life.  “Moran got a promotion. Made him a major. Gave him a cushy desk job. Thought he was safe. Thought the Tiger couldn’t still come for him. But he did. _We_ did.”

I lean forward, clasping my fingers in front of my face. The story isn’t over yet.

“Took us years, but we did it. Caught Moran, took him hostage. Made him pay. Then told his government to pay us, if they wanted him back. We expected them to try and rescue him.”

“Ahhhh,” I breathe in satisfaction. Hence all the redaction. _We do not negotiate with terrorists_ , they say. _Unless it’s someone important_ , they mean. Still. Dreadful publicity, can see why they hushed it up so much.

“They did not pay. They did not rescue him.”

My eyes snap open, but I’m not seeing the face of the man, not now. Instead, I’m seeing Moran; beaten, abused, imprisoned, starved, stuck in a filthy hole somewhere, waiting for a rescue mission.

A mission that never arrives.

A man who had given his life to the army, only to have the army turn its back on him. No wonder he went _feral_.

AND YET HE GOT AWAY.

The man’s face twists in another snarl.  “He killed twenty of my best men -- tore their throats out with a sharp rock. He was an _animal_. I am surprised his government has not put him down.”

They did the next best thing -- they hushed it up. Tried to shut him up with a promotion and a medal. Tried to buy him off.

But he -- he turned them down. Walked away. Hunts for himself now, trusting no one.

And that is… not boring.  I know him now, I know the story, backwards, forwards, and upside down and yet--

He’s not boring.

And that is… _wonderful_ news.

I smile at the screen, feeling _giddy_ . The man on the other end is scowling, but there’s sweat beading on his brow. He’s trying very hard to not crack under the pressure, but the pressure is mounting. Maybe, a bit later, I’ll bring this man to London and wrap him up like a Christmas present and _give_ him to Moran, as a reward for being _not boring_.

“Interesting enough for you?” the man asks, hoping to get a hint as to his fate.

YES.

He still dies. And not well.

  


* * *

 

## Scene 2:

###  _Tottenham: 2010_

 

"Nice flat," I trill, with sarcastic emphasis on _nice_ .  It _isn’t_.

I'm sitting in his chair. I knew he wouldn't like it, but I didn't know he'd hate it so much that he'd put a gun to my head. I didn't even see him move -- one second he was coming through the front door and the next second I'm staring down the barrel of a British Army Browning L9A1. I can almost feel the exact spot where the bullet would hit me, if he fired. Right between my eyes. Bang.

He's too smart to pull the trigger right away though. I can see it in the narrowing of those electric blue eyes. This could be a trap after all. And isn't it funny how it _isn't_ , but the possibility that it _might be_ is still enough to keep me alive. I do so love bluffing when the stakes are properly high. So does he, if his gambling debts are any indication.

He doesn't say anything. Waits for me to make the move.

"Jim Moriarty. Hiiiii." I grin my maddest grin but he doesn't react. "You've been following me.  Not me-me, but one of the many mes.  I've been following you. Thought it was high time we were introduced."  I wiggle more comfortably into his chair, cross my legs. "Do take a seat.  Let's chat."

"Let's not. I can earn a cool million without saying a word," he points out. His voice is rich and plummy in the vowels, but London-rough on the consonants.

"And yet you haven't pulled the trigger," I say, sing-song.  

"I could."

"Then I'll do my best to keep the conversation lively," I drawl.  "Who talked?"

He cocks his head.  He doesn't even blink.  "Lots of people, I should think."

"Oh you are _delicious_ , darling _._ "  I smile.  Flirt.  Military type -- it might throw him off.

It doesn't.  He smirks, actually _smirks_ at me. “You noticed.”

I let the smile fall away. That doesn’t faze him either. He’s getting more delicious by the second. I could just _eat him up_ . “I was looking for someone _specific_ . Who. Talked. _To you_. You have an informant in my organization. Tell me who it is.”

"You’re looking for the weak link. I know who it is. But…” He cocks his head, still half smiling. “If I tell you, there's no reason for you to keep me alive."

"You're the one with the gun."

"I know when I'm not the one in charge." He narrows his eyes. "I don't like it."

"That’s not _quite_ true, is it darling.”

_That_ does rattle him, but only slightly -- it settles into his shoulders, brings a new tension to his arms. He’s a hair closer to firing than he was before, and that gives me a little shiver of anticipation.

“I mean,” I continue, “here you are taking orders from a second rate mobster."  

"His money spends."

"My money's better."

Pause.  He stares.  He hasn't lowered the gun.  "Are you offering me a job?"

I rise from my seat and slowly, slowly cross the room towards him. "You dared to think you could take me. Even if you were _wrong_ , I could use guts like that. You found the bugs I had planted in your flat, which means you may be reckless, but you're thorough, and smart." He hasn't lowered the gun, but I don't stop my steady approach. "You found a leak in my organization -- _mine_ .  If you won’t tell me who it is so I can kill them, well."  I stop.  I'm right in front of him now. "I guess I’ll just have to make you my chief of staff. Then it’ll be your _job_ to kill them."

"Just to be clear. You're offering to hire a man who's trying to assassinate you," he points out.

“Trying to figure out if I’m mad?”

He clicks his tongue. “Trying to figure out if I _really_ want to work for a madman.”

“If you don’t…” I lean into the gun, the barrel pressing hard and cold against my forehead. I stare at him. "Then shoot."

 

* * *

 

He doesn't.

**Author's Note:**

> "Colonel, his records say, but that can't be right..."  
> I don't know a lot about the military, tbh, but 33 is, I think, too young to be a Colonel in the British Army. My headcanon is that Sir Augustus Sr pulled some strings after Sebastian's discharge, to make sure that everything looked respectable. Is this realistic? Probably not. Nor are genius consulting detectives. 
> 
> "I'm invisible. The piano player always is..."  
> This is a nod to the brilliant pasiphile's brilliant fic "These Violent Delights." There's a bit where Moriarty hides in plain sight as the piano player at a fancy restaurant. I am a shameless thief.


End file.
